Lugum didn't understand what was going on in front of her. Dark specters paced about a small village, their ghostly forms smashing together as if they desired to materialize. The surrounding village was basic to the extremes, where even the old-fashioned nostalgia of the wood had been filed off as if by years of someone scraping it away with their nails. The grass had lost its color a long time ago, and shined with a startling grey. It took Lugum a minute to how odd it all was. Places aren't supposed to be so bland.
"H-hello?" Lugum called out, hugging herself as she searched for something more than black, brown, and grey-green. She found it; a colorful pedestal of decorated bright-brown wood sparkled in the backyard of a small cabin, and a small riolu child ran around it, watching it like as if it could get up and move at any moment. "H...hell...?" Nightmares- Lugum had been so racked by them before, a long time ago, she had begged for death. It all came back to her.
The black shapes, the small child, the shapeless village: it was a recurring dream that haunted her every night, even when it did not arise. Even tonight she curled up and hoped that the day's events did not summon them again. How embarrassing it would be to have an episode in front of them... their presence exacerbated her nightmare, made the threat of the dream a reality. Lugum began to tremble as the young, colorful child ran about the training post.
"Hell?" The child riolu asked in her high, sing-song voice. "Don't call my village that!" She, the child, spoke to her, after years of silence. The dream had transitioned for the first time ever. Almost manic with glee, Lugum dropped down and crawled towards the child, as if the shadows would try and stop their first encounter. "Hehe, were you trying to say hello? You're nervous, aren't you?"
"Oh Arceus," Lugum choked out hastily, "what is this? What does it all mean? Tell me, hurry! Please!" She taunted Lugum by resuming her run.
A paw flashed out and struck the top pole of the post, causing it to fly around rapidly. With her other paw, the child stopped it. "Father tells me I have to hit it slowly. Slowly and hard." With a determined yet frustrated grunt, the riolu smashed her paw into the top pole. It spun quickly and smacked her before she could get away. Lugum watched as the child gazed through the open door of her home. A cacophony that neared the noise of laughter rang as if through padded walls. Three shadows milled about inside, staring at her. A very dark look came over the child's face.
"I'm going to hit it fast, like father teaches me in secret. Ready?"
That instant, Lugum's heart was thrown into disarray. Blood drained from her face, and if she had been soft-spoken before, the child's choice caused her to become completely unable to articulate. "No. Please." She had to get out of this nightmare. The tacks ringing off the pole began in a steady pace. It made the child very happy, and the shadows within the house begin to quake. Their rumblings got louder and louder, and they were soon coming out.
When the child had spoke to her she had seen it as a blessing, to finally figure out this nightmare. But now... now was the time to find a way out through any means necessary. As the shadows pulled the child away from the practice pole, Lugum's eyes widened as she felt a cold touch on her leg. "H-help..." they pinned her down mercilessly, keeping her on her hands and knees. The groans went silent with a final shout of protest from the girl, and all Lugum eventually felt was a permanent fear and biting cold.
A shadow walked to her front, and its shapeless form gave a grin. "Such interesting dreams you have," it said in pristine clearness. "I can tell it hurts you to think about them. Am I right to assume that this is the case?"
She nodded desperately. Nothing was allowed to become numb. "I would rather die." Would she?
"My, my, my... what sharp teeth you have, for a riolu," the shadow commented. "what a shame it could be, if you were to bite off your own tongue. The shadows will torment you no more if you die that."
It wasn't what she wanted. She didn't seek to die just because of nightmares. "No... please... there has to be another way."
She whined as the shadow leaped forward and wrenched her tongue out of her mouth. He squeezed it hard, causing worldly pain to come to her. "Bite your tongue, Lugum. End it all." His voice reached a hypnotic potential of what could only be a psychic or ghost. It was too powerful to resist, but it didn't stop her from trying. "Bite it! Give me my reward for having hunted for so long!"
Suddenly, her maw ripped open, as if someone was trying to rip her head in half. "Ago, Check the teeth. Make sure there aren't any openings."
"What are you doing to her?!"
"Do what I said, now! Fuck, she's strong..."
Was that Ago and Daté she just heard? She wondered what they were doing in her nightmare. But then, she began to ask what she was doing back inside of it. This was the past- it was never coming back. With a firm pull, she ripped her tongue out of the shadow's hand, which caused the bland colors of the nightmare to wash away.
She woke up panicking and frenzied, with Daté giving her a real look of concern. Her rapid breaths came out silently as the grovyle held her maw apart, so that she couldn't get to her tongue. Although the intent of the shadow was heavily implied, was tongue-biting really a mortal wound? She had been very close, so very close to ripping her tongue out just to get out of a nightmare. "Lugum. What happened? Do you know who attacked you?" Daté asked.
Instead of answering, she ripped her muzzle out of his hands, her eyes full of shame. Once again, both Ago and this grovyle witnessed her weakness. No one had attacked her; she was just too weak-willed to survive a petty nightmare. "It... it happens all the time."
Ago ran up to her, appalled. "There's no one outside- and holy fuck, Lugum! You sleep in this furniture depot inside of a cave that looks like a damned sharpedo... and you have nightmares of your own to deal with? Lugum, this place makes me uncomfortable just standing in it. What if Daté wasn't such a huge fucking weirdo that he could-"
"Hear your tongue sliding across your teeth as you prepared to bite it," he filled in, disinterested. The fact that he had heard something like that amazed her. It upsetted her that Ago thought that way about her home. It was a nervous tick, but Lugum found it impossible to resist filling the place to the brim with furniture. The harder it appeared to move everything out, the better. So what if it looked like a maze of sitting stools and couches, of beds and mats, of lanterns and decorations? It was fun to explore it. And if you couldn't see the roof of the cave at some points because
"Yeah! You would be dead right now-"
Lugum put all of her whimsy confidence into a single, gentle chuckle. "Guys, let's forget about it! Right now, Ago, I'm just so excited to take you with me to work, and to the Dojo, you're going to love it all!"
A disgusted grunt came from the grovyle. The look of concern was now gone- most likely, any emotion of the sort would be quite rate- and he frowned at his hands. "Arceus, Lugum, you drooled all over me." He reached over to wipe some of it off on a special mat decorated with the pattern of a togepi egg.
In an instant Lugum had leaped over there politely and took his paw away from it. "Hehe, don't you fucking lay a dirty hand on my furniture!" She kind of got trapped between two conflicting attitudes right then, and she couldn't decide which one to go with- polite or angry. The result was an extremely peppy and creepy way to express her love for furniture collecting. Daté seemed wildly amused by it. He broke out into laughter as Ago shifted his eyes away guiltily.
"Wow, that's like the first aggressive thing I've ever heard from you. anyway, Lugum, I think I'll just stay here for the day. I want to try and get used to this body," Ago explained. Lugum knew this would happen. All it took was a bit more patience, but the disappointment was still there, despite wanting to fulfill Ago's wishes.
"I... understand."
Daté shot a look over at the pikachu. "Oh, is that the case? Hey Lugum, listen to this: Ago went out for a midnight walk."
Lugum put her head to side curiously. "He did? Why?"
"Don't know. Anyway, I think he tripped or something, because he was pretty dirty when he came back in. And instead of trying to clean any of it off, poor Lugum, he just went and..."
She breathed in deeply. "What did he do?"
"I'm-feeling-a-little-more-ready-actually-let's-go -Lugum!" Ago yelled out in a one-second outburst of desperation.
Her paws came together in a pleased clap. "Yay, I knew you would come around! You'll absolutely love my boss, he's the best ever."
For some reason or another, Ago threw up a claw at Daté, a stoic stare on his face. She wondered what kind of gesture he was trying to make.
Something told Ago that this was going to be a day of not being able to make decisions. For the most part, he wanted more than anything to find out who he was. But this riolu, Lugum, had already started the gradual progress of taking up all his attention. With all the problems the socially awkward pokémon had, she was like a black hole that sucked up one's time. No wonder, as she implied, others try to stay away from her.
Although he was not an expert on riolu, she appeared to be extremely limber and tall. If somebody assumed she was a little loopy based upon the empty look in their eyes, her upright, military march confirmed it. Everything moved so uniformly and loosely, and she probably didn't even know it. "I'm glad you decided to come with me," she told him, "I'm scared, Ago. Nothing before made me suffer like that nightmare did... I think it was the first time I realized that the little child was me."
"Who?" Ago asked curiously. She was talking as if everyone knew- a carefree way of thinking. Even so, it was good that she brought the subject up. Ago hated bringing things up.
"Oh. Well, there is a little girl, sparring with a training pole. In this last dream, she finally talked to me. And then she started to hit the pole very fast like her father taught her and the shadows became angry. Shadows pinned me down... I was so scared and cold. One of them suggested that I bite my tongue... and you know the rest I guess. A few minutes after waking up, I felt perfectly fine! It was only a nightmare, after all. I'm stronger than them.
That was a huge surprise. This riolu considered herself stronger than something. Ago grimaced at the beatings he suffered both on the beach and inside the guild, all for this riolu's sake. Already, he formed an opinion on what would be the more interesting excursion; the 'Dojo' would be the perfect place to see if Lugum can validate her weakness. Lugum caught sight of someone, and the talk about the nightmare was cut short. "Oh, hey, Zube!"
The zubat stopped in his short hops. He had his good wing crossed over his chest like a protective screen. "H-hi Lugum." Ago was curious how the low-life would act around the two of them, after Lugum kicked his ass, and the zubat had kicked his. He seemed almost too calm about the awkward situation. Then again, so did Lugum. "If you excuse me, I must travel quickly to my destination." What else was there other than Lugum's cave on the coast was a good question, but Ago shrugged off the bandit's departure. If he wanted to prove himself, he needed an opponent other than a cripple.
"Sometimes I have good dreams too," Lugum continued. Her death experience last night must have made her attitude out of sorts, because she seemed very clear-headed now. "Like one near a well, and another with- a pidgeotto lying down on the side of the path?"
Ago and Lugum stopped and watched the sun beat down on an unconscious pidgeotto's back. What was this town? Everyone ended up unconscious or gravely injured. "Well," Ago sighed, "I suppose we should check it out. But Lugum- I swear to fuck if you try to give him a place to stay..." she nodded meekly and sneaked in close to the bird. "He is breathing," Lugum observed, "but he isn't waking up for some reason."
In a small satchel on his side, Ago saw a small note poking out. Interested, Ago slowly slipped it out. When the header proclaimed 'what to do if you find me knocked out', he began to read it aloud. "If you are reading this right now," he read, "then that means you have encountered me some place or the other, and that I am unresponsive to typical modes one would use to summon back consciousness." This bird's writing was giving him a headache. How did he get it all down in the first place?
What came after that- the solution- was ever worse than the stilted writing: "I'll wake up eventually, of course, but if you wish to mediate my narcolepsy then you must crush up the apple in my bag- covered in rousing herbs that will not harm most pokémon- bite out a piece and chew it about thirty or so times, and then drop the food into my mouth. Thank you in advance."
Lugum looked over to him. "What?" The pikachu held the note in dead silence. After a few more moments, Ago scoffed and threw the note aside.
"Let's go, Lugum, this is the stupidest fucking things I've ever- LUGUM?!"
"I... chew a bite from this apple... and then put it in his mouth?" She said to herself ponderously. "That's weird... but I can't leave him here. A criminal might find him."
Ago couldn't believe what he was seeing. "Lugum, don't you dare! You don't owe this guy a shitting thing! L-look at this bag- there is only the note and the apple. He is obviously setting pokémon up to do some sick ritual with him."
"Probably had his things stolen," Lugum said as she bit into the apple. "Zube stole his stuff," she muttered. Ago grimaced; that was a good guess.
"N-narcolepsy doesn't involve rousing herbs and stuff to wake up, Lu!"
She chewed the apple thoughtfully. "Are you a pidgeotto expert now, or something? Weird things can occur I of all pokémon should know."
"Lugum, you are about to place this bird in a non-consensual lip-lock and force feed him a drugged apple." He had thought that putting the simple truth out there had the power to stop her, but it only made her more excited. Ago desired to avert his eyes, but he was too late; nothing would ever block out the moment from his memory- nothing. Ever. What a start to his second day as a pokémon.
Immediately, possibly a little too fast, the pidgeotto woke up from his sleep. "Oh, bother... where did I end up this time?" He stood up and took a good, analyzing look at his surroundings. "Ah. I was going for a walk... and now the majority of my provisions are gone. Luckily, my note about the apple prompted the thief to leave it as an unnecessary risk."
Ago, still shocked, crossed his arms and looked away. "Who brings 'provisions' on a walk?"
The bird cocked his head to the side and smiled. "Pokémon who do not like dying of undernourishment, of course." He left Ago to fume as he turned to thank the riolu. "Ah, you must be the one who undertook that sick task. Please, accept my apologies to put you through such a sordid affair."
She shook her head fervently. "N-no, I just hope I did it right!" Did it right? Lugum was treating it like a first fucking kiss! Ago gaped as he helplessly watched the ice break from the most awkward thing he had ever witnessed.
He nodded excitedly. "My name is Flightly, and I think you did excellently. Top marks, really. You are a natural. I hardly even felt it, and that may not be said to be caused by my narcoleptic stupor. I might even dare to say my own mother could not perform adequately. The way the apple was chewed more into a fine paste and not chunks, and kept away from the interior of your mouth- very respectful..." Ago was going to start blowing chunks if the conversation continued. Plus, 'Flightly' really shouldn't compliment those teeth of hers, considering just half an hour ago she was trying to turn her tongue into a 'fine paste'.
A small gasp came from the riolu as she turned her eyes down. "Better than... your mother?" Ago was at least ninety percent sure that this pidgeotto was up to something nefarious from that single play. If the pidgeotto had said that to anyone other than a pokémon who was apparently addicted to being a caretaker, Ago prayed that they would incapacitate him and run away fast. It was a flirtation that would never ever (thankfully) work again. The bird was already beginning to play Lugum like a fiddle, and they had just met.
It made him jealous to think a random pokémon dumb enough to take a nap on a path could figure out everything he was wondering about. "Hey, Lugum, you're going to be late for work," he tried. That got her attention, and she jumped up quickly.
"Oh, no! I'm really sorry, but I think we should talk again." For a minute, the pidgeotto gave him a condescending grin that said stop ruining my fun. All it told Ago was that this guy is a misogynistic little shit.
Ago silently scoffed as the awe-struck and panicking Lugum pulled him away. Talk again? Not if Ago could help it.
